I gave a talk on Storytelling at my 50th Dartmouth College Reunion last month. Following is the text of my ten-minute introduction. If you want to see the whole, one-hour presentation, including video clips and stories, click on the video player below. Closed Captions (CC) available.

I never wanted to be a performer … until I discovered storytelling.

About two-and-a-half years ago, a friend of mine had a gig playing classical guitar at The Marsh, a club in Berkeley that was hosting a monthly storytelling night called Tell It On Tuesday. She urged me to come along. After she finished playing, five people, all roughly my age, stood up in turn and told stories. . . . CONTINUE READING: A Storytelling Journey

About two years ago, I went to a storytelling event at The Marsh in Berkeley and watched six people tell six very different stories. Some personal, some historical, all about 10-15 minutes long.

My first reaction: I can do that.

Little did I know.

The tellers were all from Stagebridge, a Senior Theatre Company housed in an old church in Oakland, so I started taking storytelling classes there. Stagebridge also offers courses in acting, directing, singing, dancing, and many other kinds of performance. It’s the only “senior” thing I’ve ever done. But close friends, both recently retired psychologists, have found new passions in performance at Stagebridge, and, so I dove in.

Learning how to tell stories is an ancient craft, difficult to master.

I’ve been very excited for the past year to learn oral storytelling—not reading my written stories, not memorizing lines, but knowing a story, absorbing it, then telling it in my own words, without script or notes.

It’s kind of a verbal jazz, different every time, and more challenging than I could have imagined.

Come hear my first “telling” outside of class (along with fellow student Eleanor Clement Glass). Some of the stories will be funny, some poignant, all heartfelt.

Lilycat, aka Melinda Adams, hosts a weekly show, called “Lilycat on Stuff,” every Sunday at noon. Once a month, she hosts authors like myself from Left Coast Writers.

FCC Free Radio, an Internet-based radio station, is home to over 50 original programs each week, that produce more than 1,000,000 listeners per month. Melinda recorded the whole broadcast, . . . CONTINUE READING: Listen to My Interview on FCC Free Radio

I am a member of Left Coast Writers, and they are sponsoring the party. Come join us for a celebration with wine and cheese.

SHOWDOWN features 18 tales. We go along for the ride on a darkly funny bus trip down India’s deadly Bombay-Pune Road in “Wrecks and Pissers,” schlep through the disorienting milieu of one of . . . CONTINUE READING: ‘SHOWDOWN at SHINAGAWA’ Book Party on October 8

Showdown features 18 tales, from the surreal Japanese bowling-for-budget match in the title story, to commiseration with President Clinton over family tragedies in “Dog Years,” to a bus trip down India’s deadly Bombay-Pune Road in “Wrecks and Pissers.”

Weekday Wanderlust is a free monthly program where three travel writers each read a story. It lasts about an hour to an hour and a half. The other two writers in this month’s program are Kirsten Koza and Jayme Moye.

I always assumed they were real places, and recently I dug around to find out how they got their colorful names. Internet research truly is the best!

Googling “Broken Elbow, Indiana” yielded a few promising results: a juicy lead about an Indiana Pacers player (Chris Copeland) who broke his elbow; an informational site for medical elbow and shoulder providers in Indianapolis; another site for orthopedic surgeons in northwest Indiana; and a news alert about an Oakland A’s player (from Indiana) who broke his elbow throwing a pitch this weekend.

It’s not easy being a mileage whore. Sometimes you have to do things that don’t seem to make sense.

United Airlines operates a major hub in San Francisco, and I’ve whored for their miles for years now. On my trip to Brazil recently, because I wanted the mileage, I had chosen a longer United itinerary through Newark going and Washington coming.

But when things got complicated on the return, I had to decide if the miles were worth it.